Rollins wins fourth Gold Glove

Jimmy Rollins wasn’t at his best defensively this season, but it was good enough in the eyes of big-league managers.

The Phillies’ veteran shortstop got the nod over his fellow finalists, Washington’s Ian Desmond, Miami’s Jose Reyes and Cincinnati’s Zack Cozart, in an announcement Tuesday night. It was Rollins’ fourth Gold Glove award and first since 2009, and it very well could be his last. The 33-year-old had the poorest range numbers of his career when you look at his assist and unassisted putout numbers at short. Not only is his range shrinking and his errors increasing — he was charged with 13 errors this season, his most since 2003 — Atlanta prospect Andrelton Simmons should be a starter in 2013 and is the type of defensive shortstop you see once every couple of generations. In fact, if not for a broken hand that cost two months last season, the 23-year-old likely would have had enough games under his belt to take this award.

That, however, didn’t matter to managers, who went with Rollins despite Cozart having the best numbers among a fairly mundane group of finalists.

While he might not be the fielder he was as a 20-something, Rollins remains a steady glove at shortstop — enough that the Phillies aren’t going to ask the veteran to move to third base and make room for Freddy Galvis at shortstop, at least in 2013. They will, however, need to figure out their plans at third.

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They started the process of wiping the hot corner’s slate clean with a couple of no-brainer moves Monday by paying 2012 opening-day third baseman Placido Polanco a $1 million buyout for next year and declining the option on Ty Wigginton, instead paying him $500,000 to walk. Those two combined to start 93 games at third base last season and their ineffectiveness has put the Phillies in a situation where they will pursue any and all options to upgrade that position. They also paid ancient and injured reliever Jose Contreras a $500,000 buyout to move along as well.

They did, as fully expected, exercise the $5 million option on Carlos Ruiz’s contract. The veteran catcher was a finalist in the Gold Glove voting at his position, but failed to grab his first defensive award.